CEO Choi Young of TOUCHGROUND(en.touchground.co.kr), a sneaker brand, was famous in the related industry before he started out his business. He was a merchandiser of a global sports brand who launched hits items one after another. He was also a well-known sneakers collector who had over 2,000 sneakers.
CEO Choi left the company to start his own business in full-scale in 2014. How to compete with large brands and produce mass productions were what he had to solve for his business. Despite the concerns of business, he reached the annual sales of 700 million won in 2015 and 900 million won in 2016. It was unexpended achievements for a small-scale business.
With the popularity gained in Korea, CEO Choi has expanded its global presence by launching its English, Chinese and Japanese versions of the site through the global e-commerce platform, cafe24(www.cafe24corp.com/en) since last year of December. He has targeted the entire world including the US, the home of sneakers.
TOUCHGROUND has aimed at ‘American Vintage life in 70s and 80s’, reinterpreting famous sneakers among American young people at that time. It is now regarded as a brand that has been growing rapidly in sales with successful product strategies.
Major customers are women in their 20s and 30s. It has strengthened customized designs and marketing strategies. Also it has secured handmade productions to strengthen its design competitiveness by working together with a 30 year-old footwear pattern company. Its rule is to provide high quality only.
“Brand strategies, design know-how and mass production system should be worked together for sneakers business,” said CEO Choi added. He also added “Sneakers business differs from handmade shoes business that it requires totally different strategies and collaboration system.”
He set the sales goal with one billion won for this year, expecting to gain more of customer loyalty.
The products of TOUCHGROUND are greatly popular among Japanese female customers who has tendency to look for high quality and unique designs. It will first target Japan among the Asian market. It will also promote collaboration works with various companies that are in the fashion and culture field and plan to strength its global online marketing strategies.
CEO Choi said, “I have always dreamed to enter the global market since my high school life. I will plan to grow into a global sneaker brand by creating new value and having high quality as a top priority.”
Staff Reporter Yoon, Heeseok | pioneer@etnews.com